Tag Archives | Tech

#PeoplePower: Using tech to promote activism

All across Africa, social entrepreneurs are using mobile and web-based technology to hold government to account and demand the changes they need. It’s a powerful medium with a lot of potential to contribute towards social change. However, there is much to be done to ensure local ownership and maximise impact.  Protests are stirring across South […]

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Home-growing solutions

 Loren’s thoughts on working from the inside out – when you come from outside the community (or even the country).  Indigo Trust is a UK-based foundation. But we believe that the best solutions to Africa’s challenges will be devised by citizens of Africa itself. Local communities have a deeper understanding of context and cultural nuance. They are […]

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On your marks, tech set, go!

Digital technology is flying into sci-fi-like places. But often, the innovations developed are inaccessible and unaffordable and therefore out of reach for the 84% of South Africans who rely on public healthcare. Not these ones.         Adapted from the 2014 Health Innovator’s Review, compiled by Inclusive Healthcare Innovation, a joint initiative between the […]

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New opportunities in e-Learning

Opinion of Professor Wim de Villiers, Dean of the Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Cape Town (UCT) For every 20 people in South Africa, there are 13 mobile phones. That’s according to a new report published by the GSMA, the body that represents the world’s mobile operators. That 65.7% penetration rate – the highest in Africa […]

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Thoughts on tech with a purpose

To some people technology is not as interesting as its ability to empower, uplift and educate people. This is only done when technology is “democratised” and available more widely and cheaply. When it reaches people and so has a purpose. Let’s think about that for a moment. [wooslider slider_type=”attachments”] When Piet Strieker, a volunteer teacher […]

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What’s on the slab at RLabs?

All sorts of things, including new mobile platforms, up-skilling, counselling and support for all things techie and entrepreneurial. Oh yes, and also renewed hope for reformed gangsters and drug addicts. Lots of it. [wooslider slider_type=”attachments”] A few years ago Marlon Parker was pushing trolleys at the airport in Cape Town. He did not know what […]

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